How to Write a Harry Potter Fanfiction
by Darko28
Summary: Now adays, we understand that it's hard to find an original plot. One that has not become cliched or overdone. We strive to help all authors attain writing perfection and minimize the amount of OOC. We are here to help you. Chap1: Love in the HP world.


**Disclaimer:** I don't own anything. Harry Potter belongs to J.K. Rowling and The Harry Potter Fanfiction Institute does not exist, except in my mind, so don't send me flames.

**Title**: How to Write a Harry Potter Fanfiction

**Summary:**Are you a newbie to the world of Harry Potter fanfiction? Are you gearing up to write your very first story? Or are you perhaps a seasoned author, wise to the ways of the fanfic kingdom? We are here to help you learn which cliches to steer clear of.

**Rating:** PG (might go up)

**Author's Note:** I can see it coming now. A metric buttload of flames. Well, I like flames. I use them to set fire to peeps and Funions in biology class! Ha ha! I am just going to warn you that I am sarcastic, neurotic, sardonic and pyschotic. Beware, I am lots of fun!

**How to Write a Harry Potter Fanfiction**

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**Introduction**

Are you a newbie to the world of Harry Potter fanfiction? Are you gearing up to write your very first story? Or are you perhaps a seasoned author, wise to the ways of the fanfic kingdom? Either way, the Harry Potter Fanfiction Institute are here to help. Now adays, we understand that it's hard to find an original plot. One that has not become cliched or overdone. We strive to help all authors attain writing perfection and minimize the amount of OOC in stories. We are here to help you.

Have you reread some of your past fanfictions and realized that they are not up to par? I know have, and let me tell you, at the Fanfiction Institute, we can help reach your best potential. Our goal is to retire those recycled stories and kick them to the curb. Today, we are going to help you, the underappreciated author, realize some of the horrors going on in today's fanfiction.

Stare in amazement at the classic Harry/Hermione/Ron love triangle. Watch as Harry and Draco fall passionately and hopelessly in love. Gaze with horror as Ginny either 1) Becomes a deatheater, 2) Grows some breasts and hips over the summer, or 3) Becomes a slut and starts carrousing with the local Slytherin corner girls.

It won't be pretty, but it will be informing.

Sincerely,

The Harry Potter Fanfiction Institute

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**Chapter One**

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**Love Triangles**

The "love triangle" shows up in many forms in HP fanfiction. Such classic triangles include Harry/Hermion/Ron, while others try to combine Harry/Hermion/Draco (Ron is often off to the side, plotting, or forming a triangle of his own). These liasons can create a confusing and contrived plot, one that usually ends up with a fist fight or an outburst at a wedding. Listed below are a few common examples of what these characters will do when they have been forced into these disasters by the author:

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**Harry Potter**

**Example 1: Harry becomes irritable and refuses to eat  
  
**Although this seems like the first sign of an eating disorder, it usually just means that our dear Harry has fallen in love. Whether the object of his affections is Ginny or Hermione, he is usually withd rawn, doing terribly bad on his exams and falling down quite a bit. What is it about love that makes Harry seem so ignorant? The problem might be that he's in love with his best friend, which leads us to example two.

**Example 2: Harry and Ron end up fighting and not speaking to each other**

Obviously, when he is forced into a love triangle, Harry becomes a bit grumpy. Usually towards his best friend, whether or not Ron is involved. Ron could be sitting silently with his head in his hands in an easy chair in the Gryffindor common room and Harry will come in and throw a book at him, or perhaps knocks over the chair. We find that this usually leads to step three in this ugly cycle.

**Example 3: Harry becomes increasingly depressed**

What more is there to say? We at the Institute agree that instead of letting his tragic love get him down, Harry should find a way to channel his anger into creativity. Perhaps he could write some campy folk songs or scrapbook. Has he ever thought about stamping? We think that Harry could be a very fun and happy person if he only tried. Pretty much, the only other solution is to give him a terribly large amount of anti-depressants and send him on his way.

Now that we've covered the three stages of Harry's downward spiral, perhaps we should focus on other members of angst filled love triangles. The many shapes and forms very, so we will only hit on some of the more popular ones, which leads us to our next victim, Mr. Draco Malfoy.

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**Draco Malfoy**

**Example 1: Draco hates love**

It is abundantly clear that since the creation of the Harry Potter series that Draco Malfoy has become the misunderstood badboy mascot. Sometimes Draco is mistreated as a child, sometimes not. Sometimes he is a loyal deatheater, other times not. But it seems that no matter what, Draco seems to hate the thought of love, which we find somewhat sad and hope he rectifies in one of the next HP books. After all, he can't be lonely forever, can he?

**Example 2: Draco is stupid**

In quite a few love triangles involving the young, hot-to-trot Draco Malfoy, he seems to failing some subject. More time than not, this subject is Potions and Snape assigns him a tutor, i.e. Ginny or Hermione. Either way, we must ask, how many times can Draco be lured into one of the girl's seductive web over a text book before he gets wise to the situation? There are two possible answers: either Draco is really, really dumb, or he's smarter than everyone thinks. Wouldn't you rather make out in the library than be studying?

**Example 3: Draco is redemed by a woman's love**

Draco Malfoy is a deatheater. Draco Malfoy falls in love with a beautiful girl. This beautiful girl transforms Draco into a big teddy bear and saves him from his downward spiral into drugs, alcohal, etc. How many times have we heard that story? The fact is, Draco Malfoy is not a teddy bear. He will never be a teddy bear. He might become a little softer and perhaps stop using more beauty products than a streetwise hooker, but he will never write love poems to a Gryffindor girl or proclaim his love for said girl in a song sung in the Great Hall during dinner.

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**Harry and Draco like to Fight**

So, if there is one thing we learn from a love triangle involving Harry and Draco, it is that when these two fall in love with the same girl, it often leads to a fight, which leads to tears. Other times, Draco takes a passive approach while Harry becomes violent and less endearing. Either way, it has been proven that when Harry and Draco fall for the same girl and are in the same room, a testosterone induced back-and-forth confrontation is to be expected. Of course, this sometimes leads us to another point in our love triangle.

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**Harry and Draco are in Love**

In some love triangles, you can just cut out the girl completely. Sometimes, Harry and Draco's fighting matches erupt into passionate bouts of kissing and heavy petting. We have learned that when pushed into tough situations, Harry and Draco resort to the love of eachother.

Although, to make it love triangle, there should be a third character on the sidelines. Ron is always a favorite in romance stories because of the factor he adds to the story: Pouting. Yes, that is correct. Ron doesn't usually go out and get the girl and/or Harry. He instead sits in the boy's dormitory, juts out his lower lip and makes a frowny face. This is why we love Ron. Not for his tenacity, but for his passiveness.

Another popular telling is when Harry has a steady girlfriend/love interest such as Hermione, Ginny, Parvati, Lavender, etc. and dumps them to go "chill" with Draco. This often leads to catfights not among the girls together, but among the certain girl and Draco. I predict that in most of these catfights, the girl would be victorious and Draco would be nursing a sore groin and nail marks all over his arms. Although Harry and Draco usually do end up together, just for the shock factors, one of them usually ends of dead, which leads us to a list of usual scenarios in a Draco/Harry romance.

**Example 1: Harry is killed by deatheaters**

This is a common interpretation of the demise of Harry and Draco's love and you must admit it does seem plausible. After all, the bunch has been trying to off The-Boy-Who-Refuses-To-Die for about fifteen years now and eventually they have to come up with a fullproof plan and succeed. Otherwise, they probably would have given up by now.

The range of deaths vary. Sometimes Harry is kidnapped and tortured. Sometimes he is merely killed in his sleep. Othertimes, numerous Wiley Coyote-esque plans are employed which include rocket skates and an Acme missile scooter. There are many creative ways to kill off the title character including death by sodomizing house elves or being torn to pieces by a pack of angry wolves. Harry's death is just not as creative as it used to be.

**Example 2: Draco dies in a tragic turn of events**

Although some would be rooting for the death of Harry Potter, it seems more plausible that Draco would be the one to meet his untimely demise. After all, his father seems to be allaround intolerant. He hates Harry Potter, so I'm sure his son being in love with his master's arch-nemisis might tick him off a bit. Therefore, it seems likely that Draco would be killed at the hands of his father, Voldemort, a group of deatheaters, or a bunch of rabid fangirls. In any case, the death must be tragic enough for Draco Malfoy, resident drama queen.

Now that we have covered the bases on any triangle consisting of Draco and Harry, let's focus a bit more on the slightly less dramatic characters such as Harry, Ron, and poor neglected Ginny.

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**Ron Weasley**

As previously mention, Ronald Weasley's main function in these love triangles is to do pretty much nothing. Our theory is that Ron doesn't really care about the person he is allegedly fighting for. We figure he just wants to be invovled in _something_ and saw this as an option.

Sometimes, Ron will indeed step up to the plate and fight for Hermione, or sometimes Draco. A normal encounter between Harry and Ron during a love triangle would turn into a bit of a catfight where Harry decides Ron could never possibly know the love of a woman and Ron becomes indignant. Often, Ron is quite jealous of Harry's love life and adventures. It seems that poor Ron cannot have a life of his own. The shock might just kill him.

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**Hermion Granger and Ginny Weasley**

As the only two main female characters in the Harry Potter series, it seems like these two girls are constantly thrown into heartbreaking situations where boys are killing eachother to get inside these girl's pants. Obviously, this can be very stressful and see why Ginny becomes a slut in so many fanfictions.

As for Hermione, she usually has the tedious task of choosing between her two best friends. In most cases, it may takes weeks of updates for Hermione to make her choice and in some stories, she chooses neither. This is because either she is sick of the two boys shenanigans, or like Harry and Draco, is killed before she can find true love. Sometimes she is kidnapped and in danger of being sacrificed to the Dark Lord, which forces Harry and Ron, or sometimes Draco, to mend their friendship and come to her rescue.

In the cases of Ginny, Ron is right out of the question. Unless, of course, you like to write those types of stories. But in most cases, the triangle exists between Harry/Ginny/Draco. Usually Draco ends up falling in love with Ginny, who is either involved or obsessed with Harry. This is an easy choice for Ginny, in our expert opinion, but we're trying to be like Switzerland so we'll just point out some qualities of the two characters, just to help out our good friend Ginny.

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**Harry

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1) In danger of dying every year

2) Unstable home life

3) No stock options

4) Blatant disregard of all other characters

opinions and concerns

5) Unnatural concern (fetish?) for Dumbledore

6) Generally all around oblivious

**Draco

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1) Good sense of style, fashion

2) Troubled homelife

3) Millions of dollars

4) Smirk

5) A really kickass broomstick

6) Pretty much just as oblivious

We tried to remain as neutral as possible, but it's obvious as to who Ginny would be better off with.

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**The Role of Minor Characters**

In a sense of irony, minor characters play a major role in the Harry Potter love triangle. Who else but Seamus could possibly find Draco and Hermione snogging each other in the broom closet while Hermione is attached to Harry? Who else but Lavender could be set up with Ron in an attempt by Hermione and Harry to make him feel less futile?

It is often characters including these two and many others (Dean, Justin, Blaise, Parvati, Ernie, etc.) who report the latest conquests of the main characters the rest of the school. Sometimes, you come to hate these annoying people whose main goal seems to be the destruction of other people's love. Perhaps they are jealous? Perhaps they are bored? Either way, the do add suspense and drama to the story through their neverending popping up at the worst time.

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**Poor Neville**

While on the subject of minor characters, we at the Harry Potter Fanfiction Institute would like to hit on a personal vendetta. After all, what about poor Neville? It seems like our favorite screw up (next to Harry, of course) never seems to get any girls. We think that the ladies should be flocking to poor Neville. He's brave, sweet, and against animal cruelty. How about writing a fanfiction where poor Neville ends up happily engaged with a pretty young girl instead of dead, evil, or insane? It is our challenge to you.

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**Cheating, Pregnancy, and Venerial Diseases**

It seems that in the Harry Potter Universe, one thing is predominantly clear: If you cheat on your angst ridden lover, you will die. Usually, (depending on the rating) in a rather kinky or disturbing way. For example:

1) Harry leaves the office early one night.

2) Harry inconviently comes upon Hermione and Draco in the middle of a heavy session of petting, in his bed.

3) Harry goes more insane than normal.

4) Stricken by anguish and hatred, Harry stabs/curses/smothers Hermione and Draco.

5) Harry goes to jail.

What a tidy little angst ficlet, wouldn't you say?

Another scenario would be the "pregnant out of wedlock" fanfiction.

1) Draco/Harry is a playboy.

2) Draco/Harry get Hermione/Ginny/Ron pregnant.

3) Hilarity ensues.

4) Lucius Malfoy has a wonderful change of heart for no apparent reason OR Mr. Weasley forgives and forgets for no apparent reason.

5) More hilarity ensues.

6) So much hilarity, in fact, that your brain is about to explode.

7) The proud parents either name their child a) Harry b) James c) Lily d) Some weird hippie name.

Okay, I'm going to be honest. I really haven't seen a Harry Potter Fanfiction where Draco gets herpes, but wouldn't we all like to read one like that?

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**In Conclusion**

What have we learned today? That love triangles are unhealthy and repetative? That Ron really needs to get a hobby? That Harry needs to be on more medication? I think what we have all learned today goes beyond all of that. I think what we learned today is that in matters of the heart, Draco will always prevail. Suck on that, Harry.

(Publisher's Note: The author of this book's opinion is in no way a reflection of opinions of The Harry Potter Fanfiction Insititute. So suck on that!)

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**Next Chapter**

In the next chapter of "How to Write a Harry Potter Fanfiction", we will go indepth into the concept that Harry is really of the son of Voldemort/Severus Snape.


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